Do you know what an earworm is? An article in last week's The Guardian newspaper explains:

Thursday June 22, 2006

Did you see Mission: Impossible III earlier this year? If you did, then you're probably stuck with the "MI" theme repeating over and over in your head. According to James Kellaris, marketing professor at the University of Cincinnati, the "MI" theme is currently ranked sixth on the Top 10 Earworm List. His study, Dissecting Earworms: Further Evidence on the 'Song-Stuck-in-Your-Head' Phenomenon, found that at one time or another nearly 99% of people have had earworms - those sticky tunes that people can't get out of their heads. "They seem to repeat themselves involuntarily inside the mind of the hapless victim," says Kellaris. On average, the episodes may last several hours and happen quite frequently in "chronic sufferers".

The term "earworm" is a translation of the German word Ohrwurm, used to describe the "musical itch" of the brain. It is a confusing term, since the phenomenon has nothing to do with small maggot-like creatures crawling into your ear and laying eggs in your brain. The musical earworm actually works more like a virus, attaching itself to a host and keeping itself alive by feeding off the host's memory. Nor does the earworm occur in the ear, as researchers at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, demonstrated in their study, Musical Imagery: Sound of Silence Activates Auditory Cortex.

All the above is horribly and painfully true. Right at this very moment I would like to have something quite tranquil, say Mariza's "Transparente", going through my head. But rattling between my ears, over and over and over, is:
"Grocer Jack, Grocer Jack, is it true what mummy says,
you won't come back, oh no, oh no".

Is this any worse than partner Deb waking up one morning with "She wears red feathers and a hula-hula skirt" playing incessantly in her head?

I don't know where they come from, and I don't care. Help me, they must stop.

I have a bone to pick with Adam, as I haven't been able to shake off 'and we sang shang a lang......" since he poked it into life at the back of my head a few months ago. *A few months ago!*
That and Postman Pat...thanks to Taiyo himself.
On a brighter note, I also have a recurring refrain of 'She's a Rainbow' regularly rolling (and gathering no moss) in my brain.
My poor confused head.

I'm sure I've got a record by a group/artist called earworm (lo-fi post rock with african percussion) but I don't know which box it's in. Maybe I've got the name wrong, confusing it with the earmworm record label (lo-fi post rock etc)... www.earwormrecords.com/

www.earworm.com is pointless (and unrelated to the subject) but pretty for a few minutes - maybe there's more to it but I don't have time to investigate further right now

Sometimes I think I've got a record player in my head. There are songs that just start up, even if I haven't heard them in a long time. Those ones I mentioned before & now I've got Gary Wright, & My Love Is Alive.

I heard Moody Blues on the radio tonight; Nights In White Satin. Everytime that comes on, it sticks in my head. It's sort of a haunted sound & sometimes matches some strange feelings I am having about things.

Beware of the Vampire Weekend CD. Possibly due to having had it in the car earlier in the week, I've woken up the last 4 mornings with one of theirs wriggling around my head. Today it's Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa again - this in spite of having OD'd on all 4 CDs of the new JSP Rembetika box. Doctor!